Neill Blomkamp Talks About A District 9 Sequel And Star Wars

In a few short months, Neill Blomkamp will release his follow-up to District 9 with the science fiction allegory Elysium. Since Elysium was supposed to be a release for March 2013, Blomkamp has already moved on to his next project Chappie. While we have no idea what Blomkamp will have in store for audiences with Elysium, many still wonder if he’ll ever make a sequel to his directorial debut, District 9.

In an interview with IGN, Neill Blomkamp talked about how much he wants to make District 10 (the would-be title for the District 9 sequel), but he’s currently busy getting Elysium in theaters for August. Blomkamp is also getting Chappie together and he can only do so much in one day. Blomkamp explained:

“I really want to make a District 9 sequel. I genuinely do. The problem is I have a bunch of ideas and stuff that I want to make. I’m relatively new to this – I’m about to make my third film, and now the pattern that I’m starting to realise is very true is that you lock yourself into a film beyond the film you’re currently working on. But it just doesn’t work for me.”

Blomkamp emphasized that he takes one movie at a time and can’t think about District 10 too much; otherwise the movie that he’s currently working on may suffer in the process. Simply put, he doesn’t want to spread himself too thin, before it starts affecting his work. Blomkamp continued:

“I don’t know if it works for other directors, but the amount of ideas and the amount of different places I want to go through the duration of making one film, means that I have no idea what else I want to do during that process. I only know at the end. So if I say I want to make District 10, and then I have 50 ideas while I’m making [next film] Chappie, and when I get to the end I don’t want to make it, it’s not a good place to be at. But I know I want to make District 10 at some point.”

Lastly, there were a few rumors out there that would suggest that Neil Blomkamp might work on a Star Wars film for Disney and Lucasfilm. One of the producers of Elysium is Star Wars consultant and screenwriter Simon Kinberg, so there’s a connection from Neill Blomkamp to Star Wars. Blomkamp discussed whether he might one day direct a Star Wars film:

“No. I don’t think so. I love Star Wars. I really, really love Star Wars. But I’m not the right guy. And also, just taking ideas that already exist in Hollywood is just not for me.”

It’s rare that a director in Hollywood only wants to make movies based on original ideas. It would be interesting to see what Neill Blomkamp could do in the Star Wars universe, but I think it’s better that he’s making original films instead.